“My Uncle Michael Jackson Told me Not to Dance!” Says T.J. Jackson on BCTB

Story by Dora Rodriguez

T.J. Jackson, a member of the famous Jackson clan, was recently interviewed by host Jevon “Jerzey” Goldson on the instagram live show BCTB (Black Culture The Breakdown). He touched upon many topics that might be of special interest to fans of the late Michael Jackson.

According to Michael Jackson’s nephew, and contrary to popular belief, T.J. Jackson never felt a lot of pressure due to who his family is. “My family never put the heat on us [speaking of his band 3T]. I think one can’t perform at his best when put under pressure. Now that I’m older, I understand the Jackson legacy…It’s because my family was so humble, that it all seemed so normal to me. But I understand it’s more than just pop culture, some people are living and breathing what my family’s accomplished,” said Jackson.

T.J. Jackson believes pressure is a good thing, but in certain situations like, for example, when your family is so well-known, it’s important to be careful with applying so much pressure to live up to a legend, because this could result in breaking one’s spirit. “I’ve seen some of the kids of former NBA legends have so much pressure put on them that they end up giving-up on a professional basketball career, because of the world having such high expectations on them, and they feel they can’t live-up to their father’s success,”explained Jackson.

T.J. goes on to explain to host “Jerzey” that although he’s never been known for being a dancer, he always enjoyed going to school dances, and dancing for fun there, without feeling any pressure. “I always loved school dances, but then suddenly, in grade 8, I started to get requests, just because I was Michael Jackson’s nephew, to do the popular “Moon Walk” dance, and that’s when I started to feel the pressure from others, not my family. This is why I didn’t go into dancing, because they wanted me to do it like my uncle Michael would do it, and I can’t do it like he did, so I thought, I’m just going to quit and stop now,” recalled Jackson.

T.J. told “Jerzey” that when he visited the backstage at some of Michael Jackson’s shows, Michael would look tired and worn out and would come up to him and say: “Don’t dance! Don’t do it!”

“My uncle told me that if he didn’t give 110 per cent every time, that people were disappointd in him. Michael was a perfectionist. You could be a good dancer and he’d call you ‘alright.’ He was coming from a really high-level of dancing ability. So, to clarify, I think he just didn’t want us to chase that, if that makes sense,” explained Jackson.

Another thing T.J. told host “Jerzey” that he learned from Michael Jackson was that it’s important to get inspiration from many different genres. “If you’re really into Hip-Hop, you shouldn’t only listen to that, but also listen to Rock, R ’n B, everything really, so that you can pull some of that into your music, and make it unique and different from what is already out there. That’s something that our uncle Michael taught us, he was into many different types of not only music but also art, and wanted to understand it, and then he would pull that into his own field,” said Jackson.

T.J. Jackson has recently released a single called “Dream Girl,” where he was able to apply the technique he learned from his uncle Michael Jackson of getting inspirations from other musical genres. “I’ve been recently getting into a new genre called lo-fi and chill hop. It has a real cool urban swing, but it’s chill. “Dream Girl” is the outcome of all these new inspirations, and it’s about the feelings you have when you first fall in love and you’re getting to know someone,” said Jackson.

The whole interview can be watched on Jevon “Jerzey” Goldson’s YouTube channel called TheOnlyJerzey. Or on instagram @theonlyjerzey